[42:i] Cooke's Conquest, p. 159. [44:j] Conquest, pp. 170-1. VI. THE MARCH OF THE BATTALION FROM THE COLORADO TO THE PACIFIC OCEAN. This part of the march led through what is now marked on the maps of southern California as the "Colorado Desert," "nature's exhausted region lying between the Colorado river and the eastern base of the coast range"--some of it being below the sea level. Much of the dreary way lay through stretches of sand, and the men were compelled to aid the teams by pulling on ropes, fifteen to twenty men to a wagon. No water was to be had but by the digging of deep wells in the desert sands. These often yielded but little, and at that a poor quality, of water. The suffering of both men and beasts was terrible. "The march of the last five days"--the time it took to cross the desert to the little running stream called "Carriso Creek,"--was "the most trying of any we had made on both men and animals," writes Col. Cooke. =Destitution and Suffering of the Men en March.=--"We here found the heaviest sand, hottest days, and coldest nights," says Tyler, "with no water and but little food." "At this time," he continues, "the men were nearly bare-footed; some used, instead of shoes, rawhide wrapped around their feet, while others improvised a novel style of boots by stripping the skin from the leg of an ox. To do this, a ring was cut around the hide above and below the gambrel joint, and then the skin taken off without cutting it lengthwise. After this, the lower end was sewed up with sinews, when it was ready for the wearer, the natural crook of the hide adapting it somewhat to the shape of the foot. Others wrapped cast-off clothing around their feet, to shield them from the burning sand during the day and the cold at night. "Before we arrived at the Carriso many of the men were so nearly used up from thirst, hunger and fatigue, that they were unable to speak until they reached the water or had it brought to them. Those who were strongest reported, when they arrived, that they had passed many lying exhausted by the way-side."[46:a] Col. Cooke refers to these conditions in his "Conquest of New Mexico:"[46:b] "A great many of my men are wholly without shoes, and used every expedient, such as rawhide moccasins and sandals, and even wrapping their feet in pieces of woolen and cotton cloth." Of the march on the 16th of January the Colonel remarks: "Near eleven, [A. M.] I reached, with the foremost wagon, the first water of the Carriso [Cooke's spelling is 'Cariza']; a clear running stream gladdened the eyes, after the anxious dependence on muddy wells for five or six days. I found the march [i. e. of the day] to be nineteen miles; thus without water for near three days, (for the working animals) and camping two nights in succession, without water, the battalion made in forty-eight hours, four marches, of eighteen, eight, eleven and nineteen miles, suffering from frost, and from summer heat."[46:c]